If the photo had STAYED in the camera of her or her friend - it would be one thing.

But it got posted to the internet.....and now it's public that "nobody can tell ME what to do (or not do)" and she's learned that there is a price to be paid for doing some things in some places and breaking the rules very, very publically.

That she doesn't think ahead about consequences is a direct cause of the effect that she ignored the rules, had the photo taken, and then posted very publically on the world wide web.

If the photo had STAYED in the camer of her or her friend - it would be one thing.

But it got posted to the internet.....and now it's public that "nobody can tell ME what to do (or not do)" and she's learned that there is a price to be paid for doing some things in some places and breaking the rules very, very publically.

That she doesn't think ahead about consequences is a direct cause of the effect that she ignored the rules, had the photo taken, and then posted very publically on the world wide web.

No Vulcan or Betan training on logic in her educational background.

If she had been on her own, and not on a business trip paid for by her employer, I might have said she didn't deserve to be fired. But considering that not only did the employer pay for the trip, but they are in the business of helping the disabled to boot, well...She and her friend definitely became liabilities.

Wonder when the lawsuit for wrongful dismissal will be filed?

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"The Universe puts us in places where we can learn. They are never easy places, but they are right. Wherever we are, it's the right place and the right time. Pain that sometimes comes is part of the process of constantly being born." - Delenn to Sheridan: "Babylon 5 - Distant Star"

I doubt any lawyer (that isn't also fodder for this thread) would take the case:"Oh, you're the (expletive) that represented that (expletive) that flipped off the Tomb of the Unknowns? No, thanks, I'll take my case elsewhere."

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…though he by no means wished to accept the invitation, he had not yet acquired the necessary power of decidedly saying No. Mrs. Edgeworth, The Parents Assistant, “The Mimic;” 1795

One thing that occurred to me after re-reading the article is she's also a liar, and a bad one. She says no disrespect was intended. Of course she says that. I think you're required by law to say that when you get caught doing something like this. The thing is, though, in at least 99% of cases I'm willing to believe that the nitwits involved did not, in fact, intend any disrespect. It might not change my reaction but I can believe that "respect vs. disrespect" is one of the many, many things people who commit stupid acts don't think about before doing so.

This particular nitwit, though, was pretending to scream and flip off a sign that said "Silence and Respect." She was disobeying the sign, which is the entire point of this sort of picture. So she had to deliberately think, "How can I be non-silent and disrespectful?" in order to come up with what I'm sure seemed like a brilliant idea for a photo at the time. So yes, she did in fact intend disrespect. So feh on her.

I think there's a difference between disrespect for the authorities, though, and disrespect for the dead / for veterans. I suspect she intended to just disrespect authority (i.e. whoever put in that sign and is trying to dictate that everyone must be respectful) and it didn't even occur to her that someone might interpret her actions as disrespectful to the deceased, the armed forces, or anyone else. I can especially see that if she was going there with a mindset of the middle ground - not thinking soldiers are particularly worthy of extra respect but not thinking their careers make them worthy of extra disrespect either. Some people see serving in the armed forces as a special thing and some people see it as a career choice just like being a doctor or a plumber.

There's a time and a place for pretty nearly everything. My favorite photo of my late uncle is of him wearing a women's top, thong, 4 inch stiletto heels (okay, so he was an interesting character) smoking in front of a sign that says "No Smoking within 10 feet of this sign". That type of photo is amusing. The photo in the article goes way beyond the pale. I can't think of a single way to justify such disrespect for our fallen.

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Some people lift weights. I lift measures. It's a far more esoteric workout. - (Quoted from a personal friend)

DF and I visited Arlington Cemetery on a particular cold, wet, and generally nasty day. I was living in the area at the time, but he was only in town for a few days, so rescheduling the visit for a nicer day wasn't really an option, but the dreary weather seemed fitting for the solemnity of the visit in any event. We were out in the elements sight seeing all day, so at some point we stopped into Starbucks for some hot coffee to thaw us out. I thought nothing of it at the time, but when I was looking at our photos from the day later, and realized that we had posed smiling in front of the gravestones with distinctive green and white coffee cups in our hands, I felt ashamed of myself for not realizing how disrespectful it had been both for me to smile for a photo op at the cemetery and to bring a drink onto the grounds. At least I didn't flip the bird?

VorGuy is retired military. We were driving back from Florida (met DD, DSIL, and DGS - aka Ambrosia Hino, WonderfulSIL, and WonderfulGS for Thanksgiving for four nights at a resort near Sandestin) and I asked him if he had seen the news story.

He was very glad that she'd been fired for her attitude but wondered how anyone could be that BLIND about the consequences of doing something that egregious. He learned the term "special snowflake".

We ran into a lot of special snowflakes the rest of the drive home - as a ten hour drive stretched to 11 and a half hours due to traffic backing up on I-10 and I-12. How two lane highways with NO stop signs, no traffic lights, and no visible debris from accidents (when the stop & go traffic finally started to flow again) could get so backed up.......made him wonder what was going on.

Then we had a SS go from the fast lane across two lanes (three lane section of road) to get to an exit ramp - at highway speeds - barely missing three vehicles and the guard rails on the highway and exit ramp (we were on a bridge crossing a major river) to get off. There had been signs entering the bridge, on the bridge, and as you came off the bridge - but they didn't seem to have noticed them until they were about four car lengths from the exit......it was a fast swoop.....I didn't have time to do more than gasp as several cars (including ours) braked to avoid the accident-that-almost-happened.

There were more SS - but that one was the only one that left VorFemme and VorGuy speechless for thirty seconds.......the others caused immediate comments about how very Special that Snowflake was.

I think there's a difference between disrespect for the authorities, though, and disrespect for the dead / for veterans. I suspect she intended to just disrespect authority (i.e. whoever put in that sign and is trying to dictate that everyone must be respectful) and it didn't even occur to her that someone might interpret her actions as disrespectful to the deceased, the armed forces, or anyone else. I can especially see that if she was going there with a mindset of the middle ground - not thinking soldiers are particularly worthy of extra respect but not thinking their careers make them worthy of extra disrespect either. Some people see serving in the armed forces as a special thing and some people see it as a career choice just like being a doctor or a plumber.

That's a fair point as far as it goes, but this isn't just a case of soldiers deserving respect, let alone more respect than other professions. Reasonable people can disagree on whether soldiers are extra-worthy or not. This, however, was a case of disrespect at a monument dedicated to people who had died in the service of their country. I'm confident there'd still be more than a bit of outrage if she'd done this at a monument to dead firefighters, or cops, or doctors, or plumbers. Maybe the latter two professions wouldn't get as much outrage as the others, and that can make for an interesting discussion, but respect for the dead - all dead - is a pretty big deal in our culture, and I think it would've caused this to blow up even in other circumstances.

The specific circumstances are basically a perfect storm, of course. You decide you want to be disrespectful to soldiers, but that's not enough, so you move up to disrespectful to dead soldiers. But most of the graves at Arlington are just "regular" dead soldiers, who at least can be honored by their families and under their known names, so even that's not disrespectful enough. So you decide to be disrespectful to the dead at the Tomb of the Unknowns, which is not only an iconic and beloved American monument, but is dedicated to the untold thousands of people who have died for their country in complete anonymity. I can't even imagine how many people died in the Revolutionary War or the Civil War who were never properly accounted for, let alone other American conflicts. Those people will never get the recognition they deserve - literally never - but we built a monument to them and we guard it twenty-four hours a day and it has become one of the most sacred sites in all of America because it assures everyone who serves our country that we will honor you and remember you even if we have no idea you ever existed at all. It's a pledge from the American people that even the forgotten will always be remembered. And that's what this idiot deliberately chose to disrespect.

Now, all that said, I think your guess that she intended to disrespect the sign more than anything else is probably spot-on, but it just doesn't matter. Maybe she was intending disrespect to nothing but words on a plaque, but the concept that words and symbols have a deeper meaning than just their physical manifestation is pretty central to what it means to be human. Also central to our basic humanity is our desire to honor those who deserve it. She ignored the first on her way to spitting on the second, and if the best defense anyone can come up with is "She's really just that stupid," I can't particularly motivate myself to care.

I think there's a difference between disrespect for the authorities, though, and disrespect for the dead / for veterans. I suspect she intended to just disrespect authority (i.e. whoever put in that sign and is trying to dictate that everyone must be respectful) and it didn't even occur to her that someone might interpret her actions as disrespectful to the deceased, the armed forces, or anyone else. I can especially see that if she was going there with a mindset of the middle ground - not thinking soldiers are particularly worthy of extra respect but not thinking their careers make them worthy of extra disrespect either. Some people see serving in the armed forces as a special thing and some people see it as a career choice just like being a doctor or a plumber.

That's a fair point as far as it goes, but this isn't just a case of soldiers deserving respect, let alone more respect than other professions. Reasonable people can disagree on whether soldiers are extra-worthy or not. This, however, was a case of disrespect at a monument dedicated to people who had died in the service of their country. I'm confident there'd still be more than a bit of outrage if she'd done this at a monument to dead firefighters, or cops, or doctors, or plumbers. Maybe the latter two professions wouldn't get as much outrage as the others, and that can make for an interesting discussion, but respect for the dead - all dead - is a pretty big deal in our culture, and I think it would've caused this to blow up even in other circumstances.

The specific circumstances are basically a perfect storm, of course. You decide you want to be disrespectful to soldiers, but that's not enough, so you move up to disrespectful to dead soldiers. But most of the graves at Arlington are just "regular" dead soldiers, who at least can be honored by their families and under their known names, so even that's not disrespectful enough. So you decide to be disrespectful to the dead at the Tomb of the Unknowns, which is not only an iconic and beloved American monument, but is dedicated to the untold thousands of people who have died for their country in complete anonymity. I can't even imagine how many people died in the Revolutionary War or the Civil War who were never properly accounted for, let alone other American conflicts. Those people will never get the recognition they deserve - literally never - but we built a monument to them and we guard it twenty-four hours a day and it has become one of the most sacred sites in all of America because it assures everyone who serves our country that we will honor you and remember you even if we have no idea you ever existed at all. It's a pledge from the American people that even the forgotten will always be remembered. And that's what this idiot deliberately chose to disrespect.

Now, all that said, I think your guess that she intended to disrespect the sign more than anything else is probably spot-on, but it just doesn't matter. Maybe she was intending disrespect to nothing but words on a plaque, but the concept that words and symbols have a deeper meaning than just their physical manifestation is pretty central to what it means to be human. Also central to our basic humanity is our desire to honor those who deserve it. She ignored the first on her way to spitting on the second, and if the best defense anyone can come up with is "She's really just that stupid," I can't particularly motivate myself to care.

I think there's a difference between disrespect for the authorities, though, and disrespect for the dead / for veterans. I suspect she intended to just disrespect authority (i.e. whoever put in that sign and is trying to dictate that everyone must be respectful) and it didn't even occur to her that someone might interpret her actions as disrespectful to the deceased, the armed forces, or anyone else. I can especially see that if she was going there with a mindset of the middle ground - not thinking soldiers are particularly worthy of extra respect but not thinking their careers make them worthy of extra disrespect either. Some people see serving in the armed forces as a special thing and some people see it as a career choice just like being a doctor or a plumber.

That's a fair point as far as it goes, but this isn't just a case of soldiers deserving respect, let alone more respect than other professions. Reasonable people can disagree on whether soldiers are extra-worthy or not. This, however, was a case of disrespect at a monument dedicated to people who had died in the service of their country. I'm confident there'd still be more than a bit of outrage if she'd done this at a monument to dead firefighters, or cops, or doctors, or plumbers. Maybe the latter two professions wouldn't get as much outrage as the others, and that can make for an interesting discussion, but respect for the dead - all dead - is a pretty big deal in our culture, and I think it would've caused this to blow up even in other circumstances.

The specific circumstances are basically a perfect storm, of course. You decide you want to be disrespectful to soldiers, but that's not enough, so you move up to disrespectful to dead soldiers. But most of the graves at Arlington are just "regular" dead soldiers, who at least can be honored by their families and under their known names, so even that's not disrespectful enough. So you decide to be disrespectful to the dead at the Tomb of the Unknowns, which is not only an iconic and beloved American monument, but is dedicated to the untold thousands of people who have died for their country in complete anonymity. I can't even imagine how many people died in the Revolutionary War or the Civil War who were never properly accounted for, let alone other American conflicts. Those people will never get the recognition they deserve - literally never - but we built a monument to them and we guard it twenty-four hours a day and it has become one of the most sacred sites in all of America because it assures everyone who serves our country that we will honor you and remember you even if we have no idea you ever existed at all. It's a pledge from the American people that even the forgotten will always be remembered. And that's what this idiot deliberately chose to disrespect.

Now, all that said, I think your guess that she intended to disrespect the sign more than anything else is probably spot-on, but it just doesn't matter. Maybe she was intending disrespect to nothing but words on a plaque, but the concept that words and symbols have a deeper meaning than just their physical manifestation is pretty central to what it means to be human. Also central to our basic humanity is our desire to honor those who deserve it. She ignored the first on her way to spitting on the second, and if the best defense anyone can come up with is "She's really just that stupid," I can't particularly motivate myself to care.

DS2 is active military and about had baby cows when I told him about these people.

Were they LONGHORN cattle from Texas - just to make it more picturesque?

OUCH!!!

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"The Universe puts us in places where we can learn. They are never easy places, but they are right. Wherever we are, it's the right place and the right time. Pain that sometimes comes is part of the process of constantly being born." - Delenn to Sheridan: "Babylon 5 - Distant Star"

I think there's a difference between disrespect for the authorities, though, and disrespect for the dead / for veterans. I suspect she intended to just disrespect authority (i.e. whoever put in that sign and is trying to dictate that everyone must be respectful) and it didn't even occur to her that someone might interpret her actions as disrespectful to the deceased, the armed forces, or anyone else. I can especially see that if she was going there with a mindset of the middle ground - not thinking soldiers are particularly worthy of extra respect but not thinking their careers make them worthy of extra disrespect either. Some people see serving in the armed forces as a special thing and some people see it as a career choice just like being a doctor or a plumber.

That's a fair point as far as it goes, but this isn't just a case of soldiers deserving respect, let alone more respect than other professions. Reasonable people can disagree on whether soldiers are extra-worthy or not. This, however, was a case of disrespect at a monument dedicated to people who had died in the service of their country. I'm confident there'd still be more than a bit of outrage if she'd done this at a monument to dead firefighters, or cops, or doctors, or plumbers. Maybe the latter two professions wouldn't get as much outrage as the others, and that can make for an interesting discussion, but respect for the dead - all dead - is a pretty big deal in our culture, and I think it would've caused this to blow up even in other circumstances.

The specific circumstances are basically a perfect storm, of course. You decide you want to be disrespectful to soldiers, but that's not enough, so you move up to disrespectful to dead soldiers. But most of the graves at Arlington are just "regular" dead soldiers, who at least can be honored by their families and under their known names, so even that's not disrespectful enough. So you decide to be disrespectful to the dead at the Tomb of the Unknowns, which is not only an iconic and beloved American monument, but is dedicated to the untold thousands of people who have died for their country in complete anonymity. I can't even imagine how many people died in the Revolutionary War or the Civil War who were never properly accounted for, let alone other American conflicts. Those people will never get the recognition they deserve - literally never - but we built a monument to them and we guard it twenty-four hours a day and it has become one of the most sacred sites in all of America because it assures everyone who serves our country that we will honor you and remember you even if we have no idea you ever existed at all. It's a pledge from the American people that even the forgotten will always be remembered. And that's what this idiot deliberately chose to disrespect.

Now, all that said, I think your guess that she intended to disrespect the sign more than anything else is probably spot-on, but it just doesn't matter. Maybe she was intending disrespect to nothing but words on a plaque, but the concept that words and symbols have a deeper meaning than just their physical manifestation is pretty central to what it means to be human. Also central to our basic humanity is our desire to honor those who deserve it. She ignored the first on her way to spitting on the second, and if the best defense anyone can come up with is "She's really just that stupid," I can't particularly motivate myself to care.

Your words put a tear in my eye!

Oh, wow, mine too. Beautifully written.

A very large POD from me. Well said, PeterM!!!

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"The Universe puts us in places where we can learn. They are never easy places, but they are right. Wherever we are, it's the right place and the right time. Pain that sometimes comes is part of the process of constantly being born." - Delenn to Sheridan: "Babylon 5 - Distant Star"